Overview
Continuing to nurture hopes of winning their eighth national cup title, Lazio advanced to the Coppa Italia final after a thrilling victory over Atalanta in a penalty shootout.
Alessio Romagnoli's late goal seemed to help Atalanta win 3-2 at Bergamo, but the home team quickly responded and put the match into extra time.
In the end, Lazio was the more courageous team on the 11m spot, winning the right to enter the final against Inter Milan. Substitute goalkeeper Edoardo Motta became the hero with four excellent saves.
Lazio's journey to the final match is not easy when they successively eliminated Bologna and AC Milan - the two teams that reached the final last season. However, before thinking about the final match taking place at home next month, Maurizio Sarri's team still has to face a not-so-positive reality in Serie A.
Currently, Lazio is only ranked 9th and faces the risk of missing the European arena for the second consecutive season. Therefore, the most feasible path for them to return to the UEFA arena is to win the Coppa Italia championship.
Although their form is not really stable, Lazio's recent results have shown signs of improvement. They have just ended Napoli's long unbeaten streak at the Diego Armando Maradona Stadium, and won 4 of their last 6 matches in Serie A - equal to the number of wins in the previous 17 matches.
In the opposite direction, Udinese - a team only 4 points behind Lazio in the mid-table area - is not afraid of the away trip to Rome. In the first leg of this season, Keinan Davis' late goal helped Lazio keep 1 point, while Udinese is unbeaten in the last 5 away games against this opponent.
The performance of the team led by Kosta Runjaic is also very impressive. They have defeated Fiorentina and AC Milan with a score of 3-0, and drew with Atalanta and Como since the beginning of March.
Udinese has also only conceded one goal in the last 4 matches, although that goal caused them to lose 0-1 to Parma in the recent round. With the determination to improve their position and finish the season in the upper half, Bianconeri are aiming for the goal of winning three consecutive away wins in Serie A for the first time since 2022.
Personnel situation
Lazio will not have the service of key defender Mario Gila, who suffered an ankle injury in the cup match. Oliver Provstgaard is likely to pair with Alessio Romagnoli in defense.
On the right wing, Adam Marusic still leaves open the possibility of playing due to fitness issues, while creative midfielder Nicolo Rovella is definitely absent, along with two goalkeepers Ivan Provedel and Alessio Furlanetto.
In the context that options such as Daniel Maldini, Tijjani Noslin, Boulaye Dia and Petar Ratkov cannot fill the void left by Gianluca Scamacca, two wingers Matteo Cancellieri and Gustav Isaksen are currently the team's best strikers with only 4 goals in Serie A this season.
On the opposite side, Udinese is likely still not to have the return of Keinan Davis, who is expected to only recover by next week. The absence of this striker clearly affects the team's performance.
Udinese only scored an average of 0.7 points and scored 0.5 goals per game without him, compared to 1.4 points and 1.3 goals when Davis was present.
Nicolo Zaniolo was used in the match against Parma, but options like Adam Buksa, Vakoun Bayo and Idrissa Gueye are all available if Kosta Runjaic wants to use a traditional center forward.
In addition, Jordan Zemura and Nicolo Bertola are still injured, while the away team also has to find a replacement for captain Jesper Karlstrom due to suspension for receiving enough yellow cards.
Expected lineup:
Motta, Lazzari, Romagnoli, Provstgaard, Tavares, Basic, Cataldi, Taylor, Isaksen, Noslin, Zaccagni.
Okoye, Kristensen, Kabasele, Solet, Ehizibue, Piotrowski, Zarraga, Kamara, Ekkelenkamp, Atta, Zaniolo.
The match between Lazio and Udinese takes place at 1:45 am on April 28 (Vietnam time).
